Luke 9:28-36
Please turn in your copy of the
scriptures to Luke’s Gospel, chapter 9. Our reading today
is Luke, chapter 9, verses 28 through 36. You’ll remember that in our study
of Luke, we’ve come to a little break between the ministry of
Jesus to Galilee. He’s about to go minister in
the north, in the Parian area, but he’s on a little retreat,
as it were, with his disciples. And he’s revealing more and more
to his disciples who he really is. Peter, a few weeks back,
confessed Jesus as the Christ. It was actually a few thousand
years ago he did that, but in our study, it was a few weeks
back. He confessed Jesus as the Christ, the Messiah of God. And
then last week, we saw Jesus teach his disciples that if you’re
going to follow me, you’ve got to do three things. You’ve got
to daily deny yourself, daily take up your cross and daily
follow the King. And so today, Jesus ups the ante,
as it were. and shows at least three of his
disciples his glory. And so we begin reading Luke’s
gospel, chapter nine, verse 28. About eight days after these
sayings, Jesus took with him Peter and John and James. They
went up on the mountain to pray. And as he was praying, the appearance
of his face was altered and his clothing became dazzling white.
And behold, two men were talking with him, Moses and Elijah, who
appeared in glory and spoke of his departure, which he was about
to accomplish at Jerusalem. Now Peter and those who were
with him were heavy with sleep, but when they became fully awake,
they saw his glory and the two men who stood with him. And as
the men were parting from him, Peter said to Jesus, Master,
it is good that we are here. Let us make three tents. One
for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah, not knowing what
he said. And as he was saying these things,
a cloud came and overshadowed them. And they were afraid as
they entered the cloud. And a voice came out of the cloud
saying, this is my son, my chosen one. Listen to him. And when
the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone and they kept silent.
And they told no one in those days anything of what they had
seen. Let us pray together. Our Lord
and our God, who on the holy mountain revealed to chosen witnesses,
your well beloved son, wonderfully transfigured and clothing white
and glistening in appearance. We pray that you would give to
us who have been delivered this day into your sanctuary from
this noisy world. Give us by faith to behold the
king and his beauty. who with you, O Father, and you,
O Holy Spirit, lives and reigns one God forever and ever. Amen. Good journalists answer
the questions who, what, where, when, and why. And they answer lots of other
things these days, as we know so easily. But if you were to
embed a journalist into the grand story of redemptive history. If you were to embed a journalist
along the way of God’s work of redemption, we would see all
kinds of wonderful things. But we know it’s not possible.
No one lives thousands of years. No one could be present at creation. and present today as Jesus is
still at work in the world, nor be present in all the in-between
events. Someone would have to be thousands
of years old. But along the way, as the scriptures
attest, we have many eyewitnesses to wonderful things that God
in his mercy has done in the world to reveal his glory to
his children. You think about Adam and Eve
and how they walked with God in the garden. Moses met Yahweh,
the great I am, at the burning bush. Moses, throughout the history
of his time as the mediator of God’s people, met often with
God at his tabernacle, but often on top of the mountain at Sinai. We remember the glory cloud that
led the people of Israel with a pillar of fire by night and
a pillar of cloud by day. Joshua met Jesus, the commander
of the army of Almighty God, on the night before he was to
take the people of God into battle against Jericho. The presence
of God, we see rest on the tabernacle, the presence of God comes to
rest in the temple when it was built by Solomon at Jerusalem.
Isaiah, the prophet, saw into the great throne room of Almighty
God, as did Ezekiel. And then we have in scripture
these silent years, these 400 silent years, and then all of
a sudden the birth of a little child. The bright angels appearing
to the shepherds who kept watch over their flocks by night in
the fields outside of Bethlehem. We see in Luke’s gospel, as we
have studied it over the last year, Jesus’ birth, his childhood,
his presentation in the temple, his baptism, his temptation with
Satan. And we’ve just made it through
his Galilean ministry. And in these things, we’ve seen
a lot of who and what and where and when and why. Jesus has preached the gospel
of his kingdom. He has healed the sick. He has
raised the dead and he has cast out demons. And now on this little
bitty mountain retreat with his disciples, he’s showing them
who he really is. He’s the suffering servant from
Isaiah. He’s the Messiah of God. He is
God’s Christ. And in our passage today, we’re
going to see that he reveals more and more of who he is and
what is his divine mission. And so we want to look at this
passage today by asking a handful of questions and having them
answered for us. And the first question is this,
where they were or where were they? Well, where they were,
they went to the mountains. The Psalmist says, I lift mine
eyes up to the hills from whence comes my help. My help comes
from the Lord. the maker of heaven and earth.
Jesus and his disciples are on a mountain. We don’t know which
one. It’s somewhere near Caesarea Philippi. It’s a quiet place. The crowds haven’t followed.
And so they’re there. And Jesus takes Peter and James
and John maybe up higher on the mountain, up to the top of the
mountain. Something significant. always
takes place when God meets with his people on the mountain. It
was true for Moses at Sinai. It was true for Moses when he
was on Mount Nebo and God let him see into the promised land
before the end of his life. When God brings people to a mountain. He intends to do something special. And so from the mountain where
Adam and Eve worshiped in Eden all the way to the mountain that
is described as the New Jerusalem in the book of Revelation and
all the mountains in between. This passage is no different.
God means to meet with his people and to show them something special. And so the first thing we consider
from this passage is where they were. They were up on a mountain.
The next question or the next thought we want to consider from
this passage is what they saw. Not only where they were, but
what they saw. And to answer this question or
to consider what they saw, we have to consider that their eyes
became fully open. They were drowsy. They were sleepy.
For some reason, Jesus disciples, when things are really getting
deep and spiritual, particularly with the business of prayer,
where do we find the disciples? We find them snoozing. We find
them sleeping. And so when they woke up, they
saw Jesus. His face was altered. His clothes
were dazzling white. And with him appearing in glory
were also Moses and Elijah. In this glimpse of Moses. This view of Elijah, this picture
of Jesus transfigured, it gives us a glimpse of our future. We will be with Jesus. We will
see heavenly things. We will be in our dazzling white
garments that God has promised for the righteous who are made
perfect and enter into his glorious presence. Something else for
us to consider. Do you remember the last time
Moses was on earth? He was on Mount Nebo in present
day, Jordan, looking into the promised land. If any of you
ever take a trip to the Holy land, you, you, you go through
Jordan and you enter Israel the way the Israelites did. And you
can go stand on Mount Nebo to this day, and you can see the
whole landscape of the promised land as Moses did. But remember
Moses died there on Mount Nebo. He died because he had disobeyed
the Lord in previous years. And God promised the people will
get there, but you will not. But this reminds us of God’s
grace, though Moses never entered the promised land. He sees the
glorified Jesus there on the mountain of transfiguration.
Think too of Elijah. Elijah wished that reformation
would come to the land of Israel. He wished as he fought Jezebel
and Ahab and all the prophets of Baal, he wished that he could
be the great preacher of Israel who would usher in a reformation
like Martin Luther. He wished he could see Israel
turn from paganism to godliness, but God gave his mantle to Elisha
and Elisha took up that mantle and received a double portion
of the Holy Spirit, which his mentor had previously. And he
continued the ministry. But God took Elisha up in a chariot. But here he sees the glory of
Christ. What did they see? They saw the
glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, the passage tells us
they beheld his glory. Very few people in the scriptures,
remember, see the glory of God and are not instantaneously killed. Remember, God told Moses, Moses
wanted to see the glory of God. And he says, you can’t, you’ll
die. And so God granted him finally his request. He hid him in the
cleft of his rock and he passed by the backside of Moses. But here, Peter and James and
John beheld the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ and the cloud
of glory of the presence of almighty God, which was awesome and weighty,
covered this mountain. And they beheld the glory of
God and of Christ where they were, the mountain, what they
saw, the glory of Christ, along with Moses and Elijah. The next
thing we consider is what they heard. Sometimes we say something
like this. Wouldn’t you like to be a fly
on the wall in that room? And we’d like to hear a conversation
or see. Or hear little tidbits and details about this or that.
Well, wouldn’t it be interesting to be a fly on the wall or a
fly on the mountainside and to hear what was said? Well, Peter, James and John might
as well call them flies. They were humans, right? They
were weak sinners, but God was gracious to them. And he, in
a sense, let them be a fly on the wall at this glorious event. What did they hear? Well, our
passage tells us there was a discussion of Jesus departure, which would
soon take place or which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem. Now, this word departure, you
could quickly pass over, but it’s the word that’s used for
exodus. And at length, at length, Peter
and James and John heard the discussion between Jesus, Moses
and Elijah, one who represented the law, Moses, one who represented
the prophets, Elijah. And then there was the prophet,
priest and king himself, Jesus. And they were discussing at length
Jesus’ exodus, which he was about to accomplish at Jerusalem in
the coming year. What does he mean by that? Well,
Moses was the mediator of the first exodus. God’s people were
enslaved in Egypt. They were under Pharaoh’s wicked
rule. They were enslaved and worked
night and day. They were to build bricks, make
bricks without straw. They were living a life of futility
under a wicked taskmaster. And God sent Moses to Pharaoh
and said, let my people go that they might come and worship me.
And so they went in the wilderness, they were given the law, and
they eventually second generation made it into the promised land
that they might live for God and worship him. And it was an
exodus from slavery. But Jesus is a greater Moses
with a greater exodus to accomplish. We are in sin. We are enslaved
to the wicked one, even Satan. We live futile lives apart from
Christ. And Jesus has come to win that
great battle, to ransom us from Satan, to purchase us back from
him in order that we might not be slaves of Satan, but slaves
of Almighty God. And so this greater exodus they
speak of, we can only imagine what the conversation must have
been like. But what they heard was a wonderful
discourse on the upcoming suffering. pain and sorrow and death and
crucifixion, but also the resurrection of the Lord Jesus at Jerusalem
in order to achieve a greater exodus for the people of God
than Moses himself would have accomplished. And in doing so,
Jesus is going to fulfill the law. He’s going to fulfill the
prophets. He’s going to obey God perfectly. And he’s going
to speak God’s word perfectly to his people. What they heard. They also heard the voice of
God as Peter impetuously makes a remark, I want to build a church
here. It’s as if God interrupts him
in a voice booming from heaven, coming out of the cloud, hushes
Peter up and says, this is my son. This is my chosen one. Listen
to him, which if you really think about it as a kind of a What
do we say? A slam on Moses. Moses was the
one that the Israelites were to listen to. Listen to Moses.
He’s my servant. Remember when Miriam and crew
decided they wanted to have some of the glory and they told the
people, listen to us. Moses is just my brother. And
God struck them with leprosy and said, no, Moses is the one
who meets with me face to face. Moses is the one I have chosen.
Moses is the one who is the mediator. Listen to him. Now he’s saying,
don’t listen to him. Listen to greater Moses, my son,
Jesus, my chosen one. And in a sense, he’s saying,
yes, Elijah was a great prophet, as was Isaiah, Jeremiah, all
the others. Now listen to the greatest prophet,
even my own son, the Lord Jesus. What an affirmation this must
have been. What an affirmation this must
have been to Moses, who longed to see salvation. He was but
a preacher, a precursor of things to come, and Elijah the same.
But what an encouragement and affirmation this must have been
to Peter, James and John, who would go on to live into their
old age, suffering as servants and ministers of the Lord Jesus,
preaching his gospel into the world. But what an encouragement
this must have been to Jesus to say there is glory past the
cross. In fact, the book of Hebrews
says, but for the joy that was set before him, he endured the
pain and the shame and the suffering. He endured the cross because
it would bring many sons to glory. So what where they were, what
they saw, what they heard, what they desired is the next thing
we consider. We like to trivialize Christianity.
I mean, you walk in most Christian bookstores if they exist, and
a third of the bookstore are what we might call Christian
trinkets, right? Christian trinkets, you know,
just things. We like to trivialize Christianity,
and Peter was the first one to do it. Oh, wow, this is such
a wonderful event. I think I should build a tent
for Jesus. I think I should build a tent
for Moses, and I think I should build a tent for, Elijah, that’s
what we like to do, isn’t it? We like to see what’s here and
now and think it’s as good as it’s going to get. And what does
God say? He rebukes Peter a bit. Actually, he just skips over
his suggestion. It doesn’t even make it to the building committee,
does it? Skips right over it. This is my beloved son. This
is my chosen one. Listen to him. What was Peter
trying to do? What did he desire? Well, he
didn’t want to end such a wonderful thing. Don’t you think it was
pretty wonderful to be up on a mountain with Jesus? Stop there. But how amazing it was to be
up on a mountain with Jesus as he appeared in glory with Moses. With Elijah, don’t you want to
get to heaven and hang out with Peter and Paul and Simon and
the disciples and Andrew and others? Don’t we want to see
Martin Luther and John Calvin? Don’t we want to meet Nate Saint
and Jim Elliott? Don’t we want to get with saints
of old? And here they were on top of this mountain with Jesus,
who appears in glory and there’s Moses. and there’s Elijah, and
they hear a discussion of the wonderful things of redemption,
and they hear God give his seal of approval to his son, and yet,
what do they do in their basest desires? Let’s memorialize it
here. Let’s let the church of Jesus
Christ just stop here, and we’re gonna have a tent for each of
them, and we’ll just invite people up here, and we’ll sell tickets.
That’s what we do with our faith, isn’t it? We trivialize it. And
God moves on. He moves past Peter’s silly suggestion. He moves on. Well, the final
thing, what they learned, where they were, what they saw, what
they heard, what they desired, finally, what they learned. In
this passage of scripture, a lot of Old Testament comes together.
There’s the glory cloud. There’s the presence of God.
There’s a theophany, an appearing of God on earth. There’s a Christophany,
an appearing of the glorified Savior Jesus. There’s Moses appearing. the law. There’s Elijah appearing. There’s the prophets. There’s
redemption, cosmic redemption about to be accomplished. There’s
the end of the law standing there on the mountain. Even Jesus,
who would put away all the ceremonial, all the civil, and he would fulfill
the moral law that we might fulfill it ourselves. So there’s a lot
of lessons in this passage. But it says to us, Jesus is a
greater Moses. He’s a better lawgiver. He is
the righteous one. He’s a greater prophet. He is
the one who will show what mercy is like. He will call people
to himself and subdue them to himself. There’s the glory of
the son of God. Here’s the Messiah who here in
his radiance, here in his brightness, here in his dazzling white clothing
is outshining the stars of the night and the sun of the day. Here is the greater Moses. Here
is the greater Exodus. Here is the one who will obey
and suffer and endure the cross and be raised and ascended. And everything is coming together
as Jesus is slowly but surely revealing himself to his disciples. He has revealed to them much,
much. And so what do they learn? They
learn that Jesus is far greater than they can ever imagine. There’s
a little phrase in Christianity today, and it goes something
like this. We love to domesticate Jesus. Now, we have a dog at our house
and we have domesticated him. We put him in a crate for his
early years. He wasn’t allowed to live or
breathe without doing anything that we wanted. He potties outside.
He sleeps inside. He brings us great joy and all
that. But he’s he’s been domesticated,
right? He’s been tamed. He’s not a wild
beast. Despite what the TV commercials about dog food say, he’s he’s
one of us. He’s human. Right. And that’s
how we treat dogs these days. We’ve domesticated him. And what
does it mean that we domesticate Jesus? Well, we like to put him
in a little box. We like to crate train him. Jesus,
don’t be too glorious. Jesus, don’t be too powerful.
Jesus, don’t demand too much of me. Jesus, be enough to get
me to heaven. But really, no more than that.
And what has Jesus done here? He has shown himself to be the
great prophet, the great deliverer, the greater Moses who will accomplish
the greater exodus. Now, fast forward with me a handful
of years. later will become the great apostle
Peter. And he will write two letters
to Gentile Christians who are scattered throughout the Roman
Empire and who are under persecution. And he will say to them in his
second epistle, his second letter in chapter one, he’ll say, look
here, folks, you need to believe that I’m an apostle of Jesus
Christ. I was an eyewitness. I was an eyewitness to the transfiguration
and on that mountain from the cloud, we heard the very voice
of Jesus say, this is my son with whom I am well pleased.
This is my chosen son. Listen to him. And I want you
to hear what Peter says in his letter, which is the word of
God by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. This is what he
says to us. And this is what we can learn today. Peter says
to his hearers, and he says to us who will read that letter,
that letter, second Peter, he says to us, there is a more sure
word to us, a more sure prophetic word. Yes, it was wonderful as
one of his apostles to be on that mountain of transfiguration,
to see Moses, to see Elijah, to see the lawgiver, to see the
prophet. and to even see the glorified Jesus, and even to
hear the word from heaven say, this is my chosen son, my beloved
one, listen to him. And what Peter says to us, to
the church, is he says this, you have a more sure word, listen
to it. Let us pray together. Our Lord,
our God, we come before you today. And as the people of old did
when they bumped into your glory, we fall on our faces. We recognize
that we are not worthy to be in your presence. We are not
fit to be in your house, but thanks be to God for Christ who
has shed his own blood and clothed us with his own righteousness
so that we can gain entrance into the holy of holies. We can boldly approach your throne
of grace. We can enter your house in worship as we sing praises.
Our praises rise to heaven. And our elder brother, the Lord
Jesus, lifts up our praises in this congregation, in the great
congregation in heaven and approves of our worship so that it may
reach the ears. of our heavenly father, what
a privilege it is to be your children. And we pray, Lord,
that we would not forget what we have seen, what we have beheld
and what we are commanded to do, to look to the greatness
of Jesus and to listen to him. And so we pray, Lord, that with
all our hearts, you would make us diligent to give our full
attention to the the greatest thing, the written, the spoken
and the preached word. so that we will behold our Savior
rightly and follow Him in this world as we serve Him and that
we may trust in Him fully with all our faith. We pray this in
the name of Christ and all God’s people said, amen.